ENER - Riots as Delhi's public transport system collapses

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ET - Anger on streets as gas law halts Delhi public transport

By Rahul Bedi in New Delhi

COMMUTERS smashed and set fire to dozens of buses and blocked traffic across New Delhi yesterday after the collapse of the Indian capital's public transport network.

Tens of thousands of office and factory workers, as well as schoolchildren, stayed at home as police and paramilitary personnel struggled to restore order. Only 10 per cent of Delhi's 12,000 buses and a fraction of the city's 50,000 scooter rickshaws and taxis appeared on the streets.

The transport meltdown followed a Supreme Court order in 1998 that made it mandatory for all public transport vehicles to convert from petrol and diesel to compressed natural gas by April 1 this year. This meant most could not be used.

Monday was a religious holiday, so yesterday was the first working day since the court order came into force. Frustrated at being stranded for hours at bus stops, angry mobs of commuters turned on vehicles still in operation.

Six buses were burned in a south Delhi suburb after passengers were forced to disembark. The windows of another 20 buses in the same area were smashed and their tyres deflated and slashed.

"There is no way of getting around the city," said Shakuntla Devi, a housewife, after she was thrown off a bus heaving with passengers - crammed inside, clinging to the sides and crowding its roof. "I have waited for more than two hours and still cannot get a bus."

The handful of women who did manage to clamber on to buses got off at the earliest opportunity, complaining of being molested. Rachna Kumar of south Delhi said: "I have just got off the bus after a nightmarish 45 minutes of bottom pinching. And for that I was charged three times the normal fare."

With the few taxis operating charging exorbitant prices, students at Delhi University were particularly badly hit, with many arriving late for their final exams.

Parents complained that no arrangements had been made for schoolchildren. Delhi's transport minister, Parvew Hashmi, diverted hundreds of school buses for public use, leaving most children no option but to stay at home. The few who made it to their schools found them closed, as most of the teachers were absent.

-- Anonymous, April 03, 2001

Answers

Give me a few weeks on this and I may be able to work out the thinking here. We don't have enough busses, mon, we need our busses, mon, ok, let's wreck the ones that are still running.

-- Anonymous, April 04, 2001

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